Spiedie Fest draws 80K fans for food, fun and cheers

An estimated 75,000 to 80,000 people visited Otsiningo Park this Friday, Saturday and Sunday for the event, according to organizer Dave Pessagno.

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Pork Spiedie called “The Judge” took first in the pork category during the 30th annual Spiedie Fest on Sunday at Otsiningo Park. The entry was prepared by Don Wright, originally from Endicott.
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This year marked the 30th anniversary of the annual Spiedie Fest & Balloon Rally.

About 240 vendors and three dozen hot air balloons drew crowds to the park this year.

A concert featuring Cole Swindell and Kristian Bush of Sugarland highlighted the fest's last day.

She was minutes from when the announcer would shout, "Light your grills!" and the spiedie cooking contest at the 30th annual Spiedie Fest & Balloon Rally would get underway.

She and her mother, Teresa Lockwood, had prepared all week, marinating lamb and testing it for any chance at improvement each day since Monday. On Saturday, Teresa Lockwood said, the mother-daughter team from Binghamton tasted their creation and thought, "Perfect."

The Lockwoods, who entered the day as defending champions in the lamb category, took second place on Sunday.

Not quite as sweet as first place, but that was OK.

"It's fun, (and) it's tradition," Kathy Lockwood, 32, said before the contest. "We got up early today, we saw the balloons. It's like a whole weekend thing that's fun."

An estimated 75,000 to 80,000 people visited Otsiningo Park this Friday, Saturday and Sunday for the event, according to organizer Dave Pessagno.

In addition to the spiedie cooking contest — which attracted competitors from as far as North Carolina — roughly 240 vendors and about three dozen hot air balloons drew crowds to the park.

Sunday's concert, featuring country music singers Cole Swindell and Kristian Bush of Sugarland, also brought new faces to the festival.

Eliza Ely, 23, and Suzie Howell, 18, both of Montrose, Pennsylvania, stood waiting just outside the fenced-off concert area hours before the show started. The concerts are general admission, so getting there early offers a better shot at getting a good spot, Ely said.

"(We've) been fans of (Cole Swindell) for a while, so any opportunity that we can get to see him, we're gonna be there in the front row," she said.

It was both fans' first time at Spiedie Fest. Howell had seen Swindell in concert before, when he performed with country music star Luke Bryan in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. She said the cost this time was more affordable.

The festival switched this year from buttons that included concert access and festival admission for the whole weekend to daily admission tickets that cost $8 per person. Tickets that allowed access to the concert area ranged from $15 to $20 in advance or $25 to $30 at the gate.

This year's festival also included celebrations of its 30-year anniversary. Friday's opening ceremony paid tribute to some of the founders of the festival, which started in 1983 as a spiedie cooking contest. The music and balloon elements came two years later.

Teresa Lockwood, 55, is one of the original cook-off competitors who returned for this year's contest. She and her mother can be credited for the festive decorations that brightened some of the participants' areas on the cook-off table on Sunday, according to Kathy Lockwood.

"My mom and her mom started decorating … one year, and it became a thing," Kathy Lockwood said.

Now, participants can compete for the title of best-decorated cooking area. The Lockwoods, who have laid claim to that title in the past, were topped this year by competitors with a full Tiki hut over their cooking space.

In the Lockwoods' area, a small stuffed sheep sat beside the grill where lamb marinated in the secret family recipe sizzled. A framed sign read, "This Bo Peep Cooked Her Sheep." Beside that, another sign: "Sheep happens."